US Firms
Every Folio briefing story that mentions White & Case, most recent first. Stories are sourced daily from a curated set of legal and business publications.
International · Wed, 16 Sept 2026
**Broadfield**, the international law firm, hired **Jonathan Crompton** from **RPC** as a partner and head of its dispute resolution and investigations practice in Asia, with the appointment reported on 14 September 2026. Crompton had led RPC's Hong Kong disputes team. The hire addresses a gap in Broadfield's Asia practice created when two senior disputes practitioners, **Fergus Saurin** and **Grace Zhu**, departed to **White & Case** in June 2026. Without a dedicated partner, the practice's leadership would have been absent in the Hong Kong market. Separately, on 16 September 2026, Broadfield also launched a **Paris** office, its first in continental Europe, as the firm continues to build out its international footprint. Broadfield is backed by an affiliate of **Alvarez & Marsal Inc.** The moves reflect intensifying competition for disputes talent in Asia-Pacific, particularly in Hong Kong, where international arbitration and financial investigations work has remained active despite a broader slowdown in transactional markets.
AI & Law · Thu, 10 Sept 2026
**White & Case** has made a **strategic investment** into **Clauze**, a Saudi-based **legal AI platform** founded by **Waad Alkurini**. No further details, including deal size, use of funds, or the platform's specific capabilities, are available from the source snippet. The snippet ends mid-sentence and does not confirm any further particulars.
M&A · Sat, 29 Aug 2026
**Milbank** has hired **Nadav Klugman**, co-chair of **White & Case**'s global project development and finance practice, as its first partner in Chicago, marking the firm's first new office opening since it launched a foreign legal consultant office in Seoul in 2015. Chicago becomes Milbank's 12th global location. Klugman's practice centres on energy transition and structured corporate solutions, with particular focus on advising financial institutions and sponsors on project financings, private acquisitions and divestitures of renewable energy investments, and tax equity investments. Before joining White & Case in 2024, he was a partner at **Mayer Brown**. His client roster includes **BlackRock**, **Bank of America**, **KKR**, and **Nomura**. Milbank chairman Scott Edelman described Chicago as an important new market for attracting talent and better serving clients, specifically pointing to the energy transition sector as a growth area. Milbank global project, energy and infrastructure finance partner Mike Duff said financings for renewable energy assets had increased at an unprecedented rate and that Klugman's experience would strengthen the firm's renewable platform. The Chicago move comes shortly after **Simpson Thacher & Bartlett** opened an office in the city with five partners hired from **Kirkland & Ellis**, and **Akin Gump** launched there in autumn 2025 with a four-partner real estate funds and infrastructure M&A team from Mayer Brown, signalling intensifying competition among elite US firms for Midwest market presence.
Capital Markets · Fri, 14 Aug 2026
The **IFLR Middle East Awards 2026** shortlist names **A&O Shearman**, **White & Case**, and **Linklaters** across multiple **debt capital markets** and **sukuk** categories. Shortlisted transactions include the **Saudi Real Estate Refinance Company RMBS Sukuk** and the **Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Sukuk issuance**, with HSBC named as in-house counsel on both. **Baker McKenzie** and **Freshfields** appear in the Domestic category for the Gulf Navigation / Brooge Petroleum deal, alongside Hadef & Partners, Ibrahim N Partners, and Pinsent Masons. White & Case is sole adviser on the Sagasse Investment Company Direct Listing. The awards cover equity, debt, loan, and domestic deal categories across the Middle East region.
International · Mon, 20 Jul 2026
**Watson Farley and Williams (WFW)** has hired a new partner, **Xuan Jin**, from **White and Case's** Hong Kong office, as WFW continues to invest in its Asia finance, energy, and infrastructure platform. Jin is described as a debt capital markets (DCM) specialist who spent more than a decade at White and Case. The hire is part of WFW's stated strategy of building out its Asia presence in finance, energy, and infrastructure, sectors where the firm has a strong transactional track record in cross-border project finance and shipping. DCM (debt capital markets, covering bond issuances and other debt securities) is a practice area with direct relevance to the financing of energy and infrastructure projects across the Asia-Pacific region, making the hire strategically coherent with WFW's sector positioning. The move reflects a broader competitive trend among international law firms: as Asian deal flow in energy transition and infrastructure grows, firms are targeting senior lateral hires with established client relationships and specialist product knowledge to compete with the large US firms and Magic Circle practices that have deeper Asia footprints. For WFW, adding a DCM capability in Hong Kong strengthens its ability to advise on the capital-raising side of large infrastructure and energy transactions, complementing its existing project finance and shipping practices in the region.
International · Tue, 30 Jun 2026
**White & Case** has hired **Fergus Saurin** and **Grace Zhu** — both formerly of **Kirkland & Ellis** and most recently at **Broadfield** — to strengthen its Hong Kong disputes and investigations practice. The move follows a recent departure from White & Case's Hong Kong disputes team and is described as a direct replacement hire. The two partners are positioned to advise on private capital-related disputes and cross-border regulatory matters, reflecting the growing volume of disputes arising from private equity and private credit transactions in the Asia-Pacific region. The hire underscores what Law.com describes as 'intensifying competition among international firms in Hong Kong, particularly for disputes and investigations talent'.
International · Fri, 12 Jun 2026
**Frasers Group**, the UK retail and sports group, has made a **$2.3 billion** takeover bid for **Hugo Boss**, the German fashion house. The cross-border deal has activated a multi-jurisdictional advisory team: **White & Case** is advising Hugo Boss, **RPC** is advising Frasers Group on English law matters, and **Gleiss Lutz** is providing German law advice to the sporting goods retailer. The transaction sits at the intersection of UK public company law, German corporate and takeover regulation, and cross-border M&A structuring — reflecting Frasers' continued strategy of acquiring significant stakes in European retail and fashion brands. Frasers already held a meaningful shareholding in Hugo Boss prior to the bid, a position it has built over recent years as part of a broader activist-shareholder and acquisition strategy across European consumer brands. The deal requires navigation of German takeover rules administered by **BaFin** (the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority) alongside any applicable UK regulatory considerations given Frasers' London listing. The involvement of both English law and German law counsel reflects the dual-jurisdiction complexity inherent in a UK-listed acquirer bidding for a Frankfurt-listed target.
International · Thu, 4 Jun 2026
**White & Case** has hired corporate mergers and acquisitions partners **Noah Carr** and **Gordon Palmquist** from **Freshfields** in Tokyo, bolstering its cross-border M&A practice in Japan at a moment when dealmaking in the market has reached unprecedented levels. The lateral move intensifies an already fierce competition among international law firms for senior transactional talent in Tokyo, where a limited pool of qualified cross-border M&A lawyers is being competed over by an expanding roster of US and UK firms. Japan has emerged as one of the most active M&A markets globally, driven by a combination of corporate governance reform pressure (pushing listed Japanese companies to unlock holding structures and improve returns on equity), yen weakness making Japanese assets attractive to foreign acquirers, and domestic conglomerate restructuring. These structural dynamics have made Tokyo one of the highest-priority growth markets for international law firms with transactional ambitions in Asia. The hire is the latest in a series of high-profile lateral moves in the Tokyo market, as firms including **Kirkland & Ellis** and **Paul Hastings** have also been active in the London and international lateral market. For Freshfields, the loss of two M&A partners in a single office represents a tangible competitive setback in a market it has long sought to lead.
AI & Law · Wed, 29 Apr 2026
**White & Case** has advised a semiconductor (computer chip) company on a **£13 million** combined placing (the sale of new shares to institutional investors) and retail offer (a parallel share sale open to individual investors) on the London market. The transaction represents a small-cap equity capital raise for a company operating in the chip sector — a segment that has attracted intense investor attention as demand for AI-capable semiconductors has driven a structural revaluation of the broader industry. The deal structure — a placing combined with a retail component — is characteristic of AIM-listed (Alternative Investment Market) or standard-listed UK companies seeking to broaden their shareholder base while raising growth capital. The retail offer element reflects both regulatory requirements and a commercial strategy of diversifying the investor register beyond institutional participants. White & Case's involvement in a transaction of this size signals the firm's continued engagement with London's small and mid-cap capital markets, alongside its large-cap international practice. The chip sector context is commercially significant: the global shortage and geopolitical sensitivity of semiconductor supply chains has pushed specialist chip companies up the advisory priority list for capital markets and technology-focused law firms.
AI & Law · Wed, 8 Apr 2026
Two distinct but connected AI-and-law developments surfaced on 7 April 2026. First, the **Stability AI** v **Getty Images** motion in California federal court (detailed in the Disputes story) raises a foundational question for legal practice: how courts will treat AI-generated outputs as evidence in IP litigation. When an AI model produces an image bearing a garbled version of a third party's watermark, the legal question is whether that output constitutes admissible evidence of copyright management information (**CMI**) removal under the **Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)** — or, in parallel UK proceedings, under the **Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CDPA)**. The answer shapes how lawyers disclose, authenticate, and present AI-generated outputs in future disputes. Second, the **Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA)** has reported a significant increase in fraud alerts involving scammers impersonating law firms in Q1 2026 compared with the same period last year. Named firms impersonated include **Skadden**, **Hogan Lovells**, **Sullivan & Cromwell**, **Linklaters**, **Travers Smith**, **Clifford Chance**, **Herbert Smith Freehills**, **Mayer Brown**, **White & Case**, and **Taylor Wessing**. The impersonation attacks — using lookalike email domains and fake firm identities — are believed to be AI-assisted, with generative AI enabling fraudsters to replicate firm communications at scale and with greater plausibility than manual methods. Taken together, these stories define the two-sided AI risk facing City firms in 2026: AI as a subject of litigation (training data and IP), and AI as an instrument of fraud targeting the legal sector.
Disputes · Sun, 5 Apr 2026
**Malaysia's** anti-corruption body is investigating the **London offices** of international law firm **White & Case** in connection with alleged 'false or misleading information' produced in relation to a deal involving fugitive financier **Jho Low**. The investigation concerns a joint venture transaction structured in September 2009, when Low arranged for parties to fly into London for what was presented as a major commercial deal. The anti-corruption probe runs in parallel with a **$1.8 billion** civil claim filed by **1MDB** — Malaysia's sovereign wealth fund at the centre of one of the world's largest financial fraud scandals — against White & Case in the Malaysian courts in 2024. That claim alleges White & Case knew the relevant joint venture was a 'sham'. The firm has rejected those allegations as baseless but declined to answer questions about the due diligence checks it conducted on the transaction structure. The **Observer** has previously reported separate concerns about the firm's conduct in connection with the 1MDB matter. White & Case has not yet responded to the latest anti-corruption investigation announcement. The combination of a regulatory investigation by Malaysia's anti-corruption authority and a live $1.8 billion civil claim creates significant exposure for the firm across multiple fronts: criminal regulatory risk, civil liability, and reputational damage in a market where 1MDB remains politically and judicially live. For the UK legal market, the investigation into **London offices** specifically raises questions about the reach of Malaysian anti-corruption jurisdiction over conduct by English-registered law firms advising on transactions with a London nexus.